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MACEDONIAN 

MEASURES 



JOHN MACLEOD 







































/ 


TiU 


MACEDONIAN MEASURES 

AND OTHERS 


CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS 

C. F. CLAY, Manager 
LONDON : FETTER LANE, E. C. 4 

NEW YORK : G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 
BOMBAY \ 

CALCUTTA [ MACMILLAN AND CO., Ltd. 
MADRAS > 

TORONTO : J. M. DENT AND SONS, Ltd. 
TOKYO : MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA 


ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 


MACEDONIAN MEASURES 

AND OTHERS 


BY 

JOHN MACLEOD 

M 


CAMBRIDGE 

AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 


1919 




TO THE 

BRITISH SALONIKA FORCE 



I wish to thank the Editors of The 
Poetry Review , The Cambridge Review , The 
New Cambridge , and The Weekly Scotsman 
for permission to reprint verses. 

J. M. 


Corpus Christi College. 
Cambridge. 

22 September 1919. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

ON TREK. 1 

THE STRUMA PLAIN . 2 

THE CAMERONS AT BALA . 3 

MACHINE GUNS AT BALA . 4 

FULFILMENT . 5 

TO A SOLDIER. 6 

MOUNT OLYMPUS . 7 

NIGHT AT GOMONIC . 8 

IN MACEDONIA . 9 

THE SUNSET ISLANDERS. 10 

THE HIGHLANDER . 11 

A NIGHT MARCH. 12 

DAWN IN SALONIKA HARBOUR. 13 

JUNE 1918 14 

BEFORE BATTLE. 15 

A PIANO IN YPRES. 16 

WINTER THOUGHTS. 17 

THE BIBLE IN SPAIN . 18 

THE SLIMY GOD . 19 

TO . 24 























CONTENTS 


viii 

PAGE 

TRANSLATION FROM OEDIPUS TYRANNUS . 25 

midsummer’s eve . 28 

THE OLD HOUSE OPPOSITE . 29 

THE MACLEOD TARTAN . 30 

THE PLOUGHMAN . 32 

1919. 33 

CONSOLATION. 34 

JUNE IN THE FENS. 35 

TO SONG MAKERS . 36 

IN BUSINESS . 37 

DEATH ... 38 

A PRAYER . 39 

A DESIRE ... 40 

IN MEMORIAM... 41 
















1 


ON TREK 

T HE grasses are stirred to song by a hill-wind, spicy 
with clover; 

Through the ambrosial dusk the emerald fire-flies 
sweep; 

Night fast-gathering dims the glorious clouds; and 
over 

The dazzling deeps of the West one star shines, 
heralding sleep. 

Long ere the sun this morning had burst from his 
mountain prison, 

We had left our camp in the gorge to march thro 5 
the dusty plain ; 

And the Cameron pipes will skirl ere the sun to¬ 
morrow be risen, 

As our long, adventurous column winds to the 
wars again. 


McL. 


i 


2 


THE STRUMA PLAIN 

The Struma Plain is one vast grave; horde upon 
savage horde, 

While the plainsmen slept, from the North has swept 
in a spate of fire and sword. 

But one and all were held in thrall by the valley’s 
poisonous breath, 

Were scourged by fever and fighting, were disciplined 
by Death. 

The soil is as rich as soil can be, where the Struma 
waters wind; 

Mealies and corn abound there with fruit of every kind, 

And roods of gorgeous flowers, purple and gold and 
red— 

Flower and fruit alike have root in the dust of the 
countless Dead. 

The ancient fate is inviolate; eagles that ride the sky 

See still the smoking villages, hear still the battle-cry. 

The nations change and the weapons. But Death 
with his servants twain, 

Fever and fighting, lords it still along the Struma 
Plain. 


THE CAMERONS AT BALA 


Night’s black tent in the East is torn; 

A cold wind tosses the uncut corn; 

And the shivering Struma fields are spread 
With mist that under the dawn grows red. 

Over the bridge and through the trees 
Swing the Cameron companies; 

Silent, unwavering, eager, strong, 

To battle, to battle, they sweep along. 

As swirls thro’ a rock-wall’d creek the tide 
To assault stern cliffs on the further side 
With smashing tumult and high-flung spray— 

So on the new-made bridge go they. 

* 

Another mist, like a hideous pall, 

Shall hover all day where the fierce shells fall 
With deadlier force and louder roar 
Than Atlantic waves on a Cornish shore. 

Those fields shall be reddened again to-night, 

But not as now with a delicate light; 

For tomorrow the Cameron tide will be found 
To have ebbed no whit from the blood-bought ground. 


4 


MACHINE GUNS AT BALA 

Now they are reaping mealies, but not with scythe 
or sickle, 

And not with echoing laughter, or with songs that 
maidens sing. 

They reap the ripened mealies with a stream of lead 
and nickel; 

And more than a crop of mealies falls to their 
harvesting. 


5 


FULFILMENT 

Pictures lost when the painter dies 
Fighting, that might have woven a spell 
Of sun-splashed hills and towering skies, 

For the battle-blinded shall glow to quell 
Despair, and to gladden their eyeless eyes. 

Music unwritten, that might have swayed 
Crowds, had the war-god’s dripping spear 
Spared the maker, shall yet be played 
In beauty, that shell-torn men, who hear 
(Though others hear not), may die unafraid. 


6 


TO A SOLDIER 

Sleep and be happy; over your head 
The hideous fight is sweeping 

Unheard. They tell us that you are dead, 
When you are but sleeping, sleeping. 

Sleep, and remember no more the strain 
Of months with horror teeming; 

For far from battle, and far from pain 
You now are dreaming, dreaming. 

Sleep; the long days of toil are past 
And ended the noble questing 

For freedom. In utter peace at last 
Your soul is resting, resting. 



7 


MOUNT OLYMPUS 

Behind Olympus’ purple snow 
With god-like fire the sky is flaming 
Blood-red. The hills round Hortiach glow 
In paler splendour, row on row, 

Tumbled, and huge, and lonely, shaming 
The petty lights that flicker late 
In towns where mortals breed and hate. 

On cloud-compelling peaks, once more 
Gathered for feast, the Gods are fain 
That purblind nations as of yore 
In maniac strife should travail sore: 

To them the moan of human pain 
Is sweet. “Your Christ is dead,” they say; 
“Youth-butchering Ares rules to-day.” 

Poor boasters! Can the storm-cloud’s shade 
Shift the appointed path of the sun 
One handsbreadth? No; the Gods who made 
This war, though terribly arrayed, 

Are false, and making are undone. 

All, who for home beneath the sod 
Lie stricken, know that Christ is God. 


8 


NIGHT AT GOMONIC 

Great, dark hills to the Westward rise, 
Where star-strewn Lake Langaza lies 
Beneath the violet Balkan skies. 

Somewhere beyond those hills is he 

Who lived and laboured and laughed with me. 

Look! many glimmering camp-fires fret 
The dark hills. So in my mind are set 
Gold-sparkling times since first we met— 

That raft—that midnight patrol—that ride 
Over the holly-green countryside— 

Erquinghem—Proyart—Hooge—Marseilles— 
Billets and trenches—and English mails— 

The sea—Greek villages—nightingales— 

Fierce Macedonian blizzards—Spring 
With beauty the gaunt hills carpeting— 

The cattle bells, when sleep was near, 

Heard in the warm dusk, low and clear, 

By the meadowy banks of the Iridere— 

Dawn—and the eagles’ lordly flight— 

And the wild geese clamouring in the night— 

In those days fury nor fear, let slip 

Tho’ it were by Hell, the delight could strip 

From youth’s war-vanquishing comradeship. 


9 


IN MACEDONIA 

The minarets of Salonique 

Rise slender-white against the sky; 

From cypress-shady court the Greek 
Craftily scans the passers-by... 

I see; and in me leaps desire 

For Cambridge court and Cambridge spire. 

The Seres road by day and night 

Is gorged with lorries and marching men; 
Northward and Southward far as sight 
The tragic dust-cloud ho vers... when, 
When shall I speak, as once I spoke 
In Cambridge streets with Cambridge folk? 

Our line is welded, trench on trench, 
Through Vardar hills and Struma plain, 
Where thirst and fever, toil and stench, 
Battle, and pitiful sounds of pain 
Hold sway...Would I might hear the cry 
Of Cambridge larks in the Cambridge sky. 


10 


THE SUNSET ISLANDERS 

Frost on the Cambridge trees makes tracery, 

Gold with the delicate dawn, against the blue 
Of virginal skies; and all below is white. 

I wake...in dreams I fought again last night 
Beside the Struma, and there came to me 
Beings who said: “We bring release for you. 

“Come; and forget the sun-tormented earth, 

The treeless hills and feverous plains; for cool 
Spread blossomy gardens where we live at ease. 
Ours are the sunset islands, set in seas 
Of green and gold, clear-seen before the birth 
Of Macedonian night, star-wonderful. 

“ Many have found our sanctuary, and rest 
From horror, from the toil-begetting length 
Of war-days, from the unrefreshing night. 

There you will find friends who have died in fight, 
And living friends, whose souls, by quiet blessed, 
For coming ills and labours drink new strength. 

“And who are we? That you will never know 
Till you forget the long, tumultuous stress, 

Lying content on flower-fragrant sward, 

Where winds blow sweet. We serve a loving lord 
In our aethereal archipelago. 

Come; for he bids you taste of happiness.” 


11 


THE HIGHLANDER 

When at length my bullet finds me, and rives the 
bars of flesh, 

Before I take the tangled roads in quest of Paradise, 

I shall linger in the Hebrides, where ocean-winds blow 
fresh 

Over the salt Atlantic leagues from forts of sunless 
ice. 

Somewhere among those headlands, where sea-birds 
swoop and call, 

Or high in royal cloudscape, or in hills of heather 
and pine, 

In sheltered loch, or laughing glen, in burn or water¬ 
fall— 

Somewhere, a spirit tells me, there is set for me a 
sign. 

And when my soul has rested, and is strong for jour¬ 
neying, 

I shall find the sign, and read it, and learn from it 
my road. 

And, Oh! I hope to find in Heaven the joyous scents 
of Spring 

On birchen woods and brackeny braes, when I 
reach my last abode. 


12 


A NIGHT MARCH 

I he sun has set, and the wild dogs wake; 

Far in the hills the sheep-bells sound; 

Klisali’s seven lights are lit. 

Frogs, brass-tongued, where the misty lake 
Merges slowly in marshy ground, 

Jeer and cackle with vacant wit. 

We from our scarce-pitched bivouac 
Take the road, as of old in France 
Alert we took it; mosquitoes dance 

And shrill with delight up the vagabond track 
In the swirling dust; and the pipers play 
As our kilted company marches away. 

Hard on our flank the Ilanli height 

Looks on the plain, and hems our view 
Of burning stars in a Balkan sky. 

Low by the lake, thro’ the odorous night, 

On a track that Persian and Roman knew, 
Strong-limbed, the Scottish Brigade streams by. 

And to those that follow the pipes, what fate 
In the hidden days of the year shall come? 
Some shall see wounds and Scotland, some 

By the Struma waters shall lie in state, 

Stricken of fever or foe; for them 
The cannon shall thunder a requiem. 


13 


DAWN IN SALONIKA HARBOUR 

nn 

1 he frore peaks redden; icily 
The Vardar wind lashes the sea 
To furious-frothing mutiny... 

Ah God! that I might see again 
The Dornoch hills, clear after rain, 

And the firth-mirrored lights of Tain, 

As when on nights of heather-scent 
With one time-proven friend I went 
Along the shining sands, content. 


14 


JUNE 1918 

War’s joyless hurricane has blown 

The whole world through; and nations whirled 

Like Autumn leaves, cry for distress. 

But not on fields of earth alone 
Is army against army hurled 
In long-drawn battle bitterness. 

Camped on the spiritual plain 
That spreads to Heaven’s gem-hewn gate 
The tawdry ravening hosts of Hell 
Lay siege. And there with ghostly pain 
Unutterable, Love battles Hate 
To guard God’s holiest citadel. 

Hell besets Heaven remorselessly. 

In each man’s soul an acre lies 
Swept by their war; and all men cling 
To hell’s sweet, deathly luxury— 

Or suffer with Hell’s adversaries 
Siege-straitened, sleepless, famishing. 

There is no neutral road to take; 

There is no passive goodness. Cast 
Your lot with Hell, or in the press 
Strike, true to God. Help or forsake: 

And when the Evil One at last 
Flies screaming into nothingness,— 

When pain and fear are discreate, 

Outworn—When Beauty unsearchable 
Triumphs, and joy that nought can dim— 
God’s army shall annihilate 
Hell’s mercenaries; but they shall dwell, 

God’s troops, for ever at one with Him. 


15 


BEFORE BATTLE 

The slow stars wheel in the heavens: a dog barks: 
over the marshes 

Invisible geese give tongue, like hell-hounds chasing a 
lost soul. 

When the furnace of dawn smelts night, and the 
Earth’s quick hues reassemble, 

This once-green valley will shudder and throb with 
Artillery, hurling 

Shells that scream with a death-lust, menacing, eager, 
triumphant. 

Many a man they will claim, and many the gusty 
machine guns... 

O God! who enduredst death as a man for Thy 
Father’s Kingdom, 

Take in Thy hands our lives, and to them, whom 
shattering metal 

Delivers from blinding flesh, from fear, from the 
bondage of matter, 

Grant three favours: for Thee to fight more faithfully, 
seeing 

The whole long line of the battle of God; to rejoice 
more deeply 

In beauty; to pierce to the centre the pure glad flame 
of Thy presence. 


16 


A PIANO IN YPRES 

As old tunes, loved in boyhood, come 
To one by burdening thought oppressed 
Through twilit peace, when all the West 
Glows large and pure; amazed he feels 
A keen awe stirring in his breast; 

Beauty he drinks that thrills and heals, 
And learns that God is never dumb;— 

As light on dewy grass to eyes 
Toil-weary, by some meadowy stream 
With briar fringed, where one may dream 
Daylong in strengthening solitude; 

Birds sing; a myriad ripples gleam 
Golden on waters heaven-hued 
That mirror darting dragon-flies;— 

So is her voice to a lover brought, 

His spirit, when he hears her sing, 
Miraculously blossoming 
To passion, tenderness and awe. 

So to her eyes awakening 

And sunshot hair, he learns the law 

That Love of purity is wrought. 


17 


WINTER THOUGHTS 

Lad, in the hour of black depression 
Give not your soul to gloom’s possession. 
Thus you may fight it. Search your mind 
With recollection, till you find 
A golden Summer morning spent 
In friendship, health, and merriment. 

Then listen till you hear the sea 
Plash on the shore melodiously. 

Look till your eyes again behold 
The hissing pebbles seaward rolled, 

And, as the waves break one by one, 

Spray jewels flashing in the sun. 

Strip and dive headlong. Know the blessing 
Of clean, cool deeps your skin caressing. 
Smell, as to land you turn once more, 

The good, wet seaweed on the shore. 

Rich brine upon your lips is spread; 

Taste it, and you have banqueted. 

If still your mind be touched with gloom, 
Search till you see a firelit room 
Snug, with drawn curtains, till you hear 
Child-laughter, innocent and clear. 

Join, as of old, the happy ring; 

It is you that they are welcoming, 

Those eager eyes. Be but a child 
Smiling for joy, as once you smiled, 

And lo! the poisoning gloom is fled, 

Leaving you wholly comforted. 

McL. 2 


18 


THE BIBLE IN SPAIN 

Through proud, unhappy, faction-riven Spain 
Unscathed he journeyed, labouring to sow 
The living Gospel. For his overthrow 
A priesthood, loving darkness, schemed in vain. 

Nor force, nor cunning malice could restrain 

God’s dawn, their dreaded doom. For if men know 
The truth, never can superstitious show 
And twilight terror swathe their souls again. 

“ The fields are dim,” say doubters; “ though he spent 
Tyrannous years of toil, we see no prize 
Worth fever, peril and imprisonment”— 

Before the strong sun leap the horizon, light 
Comes slowly, lest his rays, too sudden-bright, 

For ever darken unaccustomed eyes. 


19 


THE SLIMY GOD 

The air was still and thunderous; yellow clouds 
Brooded ill-shapen on the hueless hills 
Charged with a boding evil. Sinister trees 
O’erhung the choking road that like a snake 
Writhed between peaks and fever-haunted glens. 

No birds made melody; no crickets chirped 
Contentment. All things seemed awaiting—what 
I knew not, but I kneW it was not good. 

On, on I walked. And now the road would climb 
Round rocky shoulders, where dwarf-holly bunched 
With strong and intricate entanglement 
As if to clutch at terror-driven feet. 

Now it would steeply plunge into dank valleys, 
Sunless and stagnant like remembered sin; 

Now it would pass scum-covered pools, and now 
Through woods where whispering tree to whispering 
tree 

Told fearful secrets, and invisible eyes— 

(I felt them)—peered from every shadowy branch. 

At length I halted weary, and prepared 
For food and sleep. A pleasant burn there was, 
Born amid smooth round stones, that trickled clear, 
Tiny but clear, between two slopes of grass 
As smooth as the lawn, shaven for years, beneath 
The elms of an English mansion. There I pitched 
My bivouac, and from my wallet drew 
Bread and a flask of wine and dates and meat 


2—2 


Then, while the sky all round was muttering hate, 
And distant lightning flickered ceaselessly, 

I gathered sticks and grasses, made a fire, 

Fed, and lay down to sleep. Far off a dog 
Howled. 


As I passed from waking life to sleep 
A monstrous panic swallowed up my mind. 

As in November from the sea a mist 
Will rise and spread, embosoming the land; 
No hills there are, no villages, no trees, 

But all is clinging whiteness, till the sun, 

A kindly god, sucks off the mist; yet still 
It lingers here and there in deep ravines. 

Even so did Reason, battling with the panic, 
Unfog my mind. Yet still in the dark depths 
Fear lurked unclean. Fearing I fell asleep. 


When I awoke, thunder assailed the world, 
Crash upon terrifying crash; the sky 
Was torn by jagged flashes that made plain 
Each separate cloud where blackness was before. 
The tropic rain beat down tumultuously, 
Flooding my meagre tent, and at my feet 
Angrily roared the burn, tiny no more. 

I rose with sodden garments, to behold 
Earth cowering under stormy skies, when lo! 

In a lightning flash immeasurably bright 
I saw a striding form; and all my fears 
Took hideous shape, vehement, conquering. 

A man it was with wind-blown hair; his eyes 


21 


Burned with a maniac fire. Flash after flash 
Revealed him nearer. Now his harsh voice came 
Chaunting a wild song unmelodiously. 

“ O god, my god, whom I have reared 
Slimy and strong, thy sacrifice 

Is flesh of man, is flesh of man. 

Oh god, my god, slimy and strong, 

To-night the banquet is prepared— 

Soon shall thou feast on flesh of man.” 

Nor right, nor left he looked, as unaware 
Of other presence. But I knew that he 
Would turn and come towards me, and my fear 
Devoured my wits and choked my sobbing breath. 
On strode the baneful figure, heeding not 
The giant agony of the firmament. 

He turned. I tried to run; my limbs were bound 
With bonds intangible. No utterance 
Came from a throat, straining to scream for help. 
Then of a sudden broke the spell; I ran 
Blindly amid the darkness, till I tripped 
Headlong, and, as I started up, he sprang 
Bearing me down again; then lifted me 
With sinewy clutch. Demoniac merriment 
Wrinkled his face. “The sacrifice!” he cried, 

“My god shall taste his sacrifice of blood!” 

Vainer my struggle than a wilful babe’s 
Snatched by its mother from some perilous joy. 

Over the hills he bore me; as we went 
The storm passed, and the clouds broke. Star by 
star 

Blazed into view the splendid, ancient skies. 


22 


After the rain, the small hill-creatures woke. 
Snakes rustled in the dripping grasses; loud 
Clamoured the frogs in parliament. I thought, 
“What is this slimy god? Monster or ghost?” 
Fantastic answers surged a thousandfold, 
Unbidden, each more horrible than that 
Before it, each less horrible than the thing 
I was to encounter. 


While he carried me, 

Now unresisting, Deathwards, the loud storm 
Had circled near again in thunderous mass. 

The first slow drops had splashed upon my face 
When a foul smell engulfed us. Gleefully 
He chuckled “Sacrifice...my god...prepared.” 

Then louder cried he, “Hitherto, O god, 

The flesh of meaner beasts has been thy fare, 

Taste thy true food to-night, the flesh of man! ” 

He halted where a cliff dropped sheer beneath, 

Then raised me high and hurled me. As I fell 
Through rushing darkness, lightning struck the cliff 
Above, and in the thunderclap I swooned. 

Bird-song, fresh breezes, sunshine, glistening dew, 

I heard and felt and saw. Contentedly 
I wondered “Am I dead?” till I beheld 
Lying around me many mangled sheep, 

And lo! beside me lay a monstrous slug, 

Large as a horse, blood-slobbering, unclean. 

I knew it for the madman’s god, and knew— 

Its back was broken—that my fall had given 
The god, and not the victim, unto Death. 


For when I fell with murderous force, its bulk 
Had saved me from the rocks, and saving me 
The slug itself had perished. Full of joy 
I found a pathway up the cliffs, by which 
The priest of that foul god had daily climbed 
To tend and worship. 

Toppling on the brink 

In death there grinned a body, lightning charred. 
Monster and minister were dead; and I, 

Free and at one with the sweet-riotous larks, 

To God out-poured my praiseful gratitude. 


24 


TO- 

As through a town a river flows 
Foul and unsightly; but at night 
Each lovely lamp across it throws 
A band of golden-glimmering light. 

So is your radiant music thrown 
Over my thought’s unlovely tide: 
Nor is the surface touched alone; 

All blazes, all is purified. 


25 


TRANSLATION FROM OEDIPUS 
TYRANNUS 

THE PARODOS 

o sweet-voiced utterance, given of Zeus, what 
form did’st thou take 

To come to glorious Thebes from gold-stored Pytho? 
I quake 

And my fearful mind is racked with horror, O Delian- 
bred, 

Whom men as the healer loudly invoke; for thy pur¬ 
pose I dread, 

Newly to fall perchance, or repeated as years roll by; 

Tell me, thou scion of golden Hope, speech doomed 
not to die. 

First upon thee, Athena, Zeus-born, doomed not to 
die. 

With my sister Artemis, ever the help of my country, 
I cry,— 

Artemis, set on her far-famed throne in the circling 
mart,— 

Appear, death vanquishers, three with Apollo of far- 
flung dart! 

If to avert the vengeance that sprang in the city of 
yore 

Ye drave the flame of the evil from Thebes, approach 
as before. 

Alas! for the evils I bear are unnumbered: sickness 
has sway 

Over all that dwell in the city, and none is inspired 
to say 


What weapon may quell it. For neither does fruit in¬ 
crease on the earth, 

Famous for fruit, nor do women surmount their pangs 
at the birth 

Of still-born children; but thou would’st see them— 
each from the rest 

Apart,—like a well-winged bird, on fire’s irresistible 
zest, 

Hastening on to the shores of the deity throned in the 
West. 

Unnumbered their deaths; and with them the city 
perishes too; 

But there on the plains the death-bringing babes that 
no Thebans rue 

Lie all unpitied. And now the grey-haired mothers 
and wives 

To the high-banked altar, where each from her own 
habitation arrives, 

Flock as suppliants, moaning aloud for their grievous 
plight; 

And sorrowful voices blend with the paean’s loud- 
ringing rite. 

O golden daughter of Zeus, avert it with fair-sent 
might. 

And grant us that scourging Ares, who bears no 
brazen shield, 

But flaming dashes to meet me with terrible clamour, 
may yield, 

And wind-borne back from my fatherland, speed to 
the monstrous hall 

Of Amphitrite, on into the churlish anchorage fall 


27 


Of the Thracian surge. For if aught should escape the 
clutches of night 

Utterly day destroys it. O thou that wieldest in 
might 

The levin’s fiery breath, with thy bolt o’erwhelm him, 
and smite! 

Guardian king, I would that the showering arrows 
might go, 

Ranged on our side for a help, from the twisted gold 
of thy bow, 

And the fiery breath of the torches of Artemis, flash¬ 
ing with light 

On Lycian hills; and that Bacchus the ruddy whom 
mortals invite 

To cheer them, the gold-girt god, yclept by the name 
of this land, 

Ardent might come from Heaven, attended by Mae¬ 
nad band, 

And shatter the godless god, with the blaze of his 
pine-wrought brand! 


28 


MIDSUMMER’S EVE 

From field and farm the colour goes; 

Thro’ whispering pine-woods, dank with dew, 
Shapes flit from tree to ghostly tree. 

Over the moor a bleak wind blows; 

Ash-tree and elm and sycamore 
Are touched with evil mystery. 

When something stealthily tries the latch, 

Bar the door doubly, if no step 
Came, sounding safety, up the road. 

For the fairy-folk are abroad; they snatch 
Or wits or life from wanderers 
Caught roofless ere the cock has crowed. 


29 


THE OLD HOUSE OPPOSITE 

The other houses hem it round, 

The tallest of the row: 

And in its sad, unweeded ground 
Dark trees of cypress grow. 

Empty it stands, as it has stood 
For twenty years: and there 

The ghosts of former dwellers brood, 

And creak upon the stair. 

And sometimes, when at dead of night 
Across the road I peer, 

I seem to see a ghostly light 
In the old house, and hear, 

Amid the sighing of the trees, 

A phantom fiddler play: 

And dimly borne on the midnight breeze 
Come airs of yesterday. 

But while I stare, and long for more 
The lights and music wane, 

Till all behind that blistered door 
Is still and dark again. 


30 


THE MACLEOD TARTAN 

Green and red and blue and golden is my tartan; 
when I see 

These four colours interwoven, lo! in the mind’s swift 
alchemy 

All the beauties of the Highlands live renewed per¬ 
petually. 


Golden stretch the sandy ridges, when the sea has 
ebbed away; 

Golden too the loch beneath the faded torches of the 
day 

Lingering in the West; and gold the whins that flare 
upon the brae. 


Blue the distant mountain; blue the heavens on a 
summer night; 

Blue her eyes; and blue the hare-bell; blue the haze 
that dims our sight, 

Steeping all the valley in a morning magic of delight. 


Red the berries of the rowan; by the peaty burn they 
grow; 

Red within our stone-flagged kitchen shone the 
embers’ cheerful glow, 

While on plate and shelf and table shadows flitted to 
and fro. 


31 


Green the gloom that fills the pine-wood, pent among 
the tossing trees; 

Green the baby-shoots of corn that ripple, ripple in 
the breeze; 

Green and blue the insistent tides that thunder on the 
Hebrides. 

Green and red and blue and golden is my tartan; 
when I see 

These four colours interwoven, lo! in the mind’s swift 
alchemy 

All the beauties of the Highlands live renewed per¬ 
petually. 


32 


THE PLOUGHMAN 

His plough all day with unending toil 
Ill-clad he drove thro’ the stubborn soil. 

His horses sweated. We passed him by 
Purblind and half-contemptuously; 

But ever between the hedges, intent 
On the needs of his homely task, he went. 

Evening brought truth; as the light grew dim, 
Patched coat was lost in beauty of limb. 

Gold shone the furrowy earth, and gold 
The smoke from his horses in splendour rolled. 
But he like a God unheeding went, 
Food-giving, strong, benevolent. 


33 


1919 

Spring-time in Corpus, as of old, 
From Winter’s Puritan drab set free, 
Quickens the medieval mould 

With peace-remembering pageantry. 

Tulip on crimson tulip burns; 

Wall-flowers sway in pied gavottes, 
With lilies-of-the-valley, ferns, 

Pansies, and frank forget-me-nots. 

Here men from War’s harsh agonies 
Returning may unburden all, 

Where flower-bed with creeper vies 
In loved, oblivious carnival. 


McL. 


3 


34 


CONSOLATION 

Abandon now and here your pride; 

Forget the deadening might-have-been ; 
The breezy Cambridge countryside 
Is round you, murmurous and green. 

Listen! beyond the sighing grain, 

The children, bird-song, hay-carts, bees, 
Beyond all sound, you may attain 
To life’s essential harmonies. 


35 


JUNE IN THE FENS 

The term is ended; let us go, 

Dust-free, by willowy bend and reach 

Past Ditton Church and Waterbeach, 

Where beryl-hued and shimmering-slow 
Our Cam sedately dawdles down 
To the huddled roofs of Ely town. 

Beneath the circling stars we’ll sleep, 
Where the flat elder-bloom is rife. 

The sun shall wake us, fresh with life. 

At noon we’ll bathe (nor dive too deep 
Lest weeds entangle). Beer and bread, 
Oar-weary, in some field we’ll spread. 

Roses by rushy creeks aloof 

Dreamily cluster; smokeless skies 
Sweep greatly down to spires that rise 

From billowy trees; with shining roof 
Seen to the Gogs by Cambridge men 
Ely Cathedral lords the fen. 


36 


TO SONG MAKERS 

Bagmen of Beauty, to and fro 
Through shire and town your samples go. 

They fire us, till we long to share 
Beauty’s far-hidden wonder-ware. 

We search; and find it with surprise 
Spread all the while before our eyes. 


37 


IN BUSINESS 

He thinks how the mirrored foliage flirts 

With the wash of a punt on the rippling Cam, 
Tho’ problems of wool for intricate shirts 
Should gaol his fancy in Birmingham. 

The traffic-babel is fading now; 

The insistent grind of machinery yields 
To a slow stream tenderly lapping his bow 

And the blackbirds’ paean from Newnham fields. 


3—3 


38 


DEATH 

The room is fading from my eyes— 

I feel no more the downward pull 
Of matter—I hear harmonies 
Immeasurably beautiful.... 

The veil has vanished—Time and Space 
Hedge me no longer—I have trod 
Infinity, and face to face 

Seen Love, and know that Love is God. 


39 


A PRAYER 

Into my feeble heart instil 
Gentleness, love, and fortitude, 
Humour, clear vision, scorn-proof will, 
And flaming valour, unsubdued 
Though pain and evil and despair 
Lurk to destroy it everywhere. 

Grant me not overmuch success, 

O Lord, in temporal desire ; 

Strength comes with conquered bitterness 
In the white heat of failure’s fire 
Temper my soul to be a sword 
Fit for Thy use in battle, Lord. 


40 


A DESIRE 

Of Him, that to each ghost allots a task, 
This boon I ask— 

That, when I die, I share the toil that brings 
Life’s wonder-things, 

By men forgotten, to the eyes and ears 
Of nursery-seers. 


41 


IN MEMORIAM 

With the Great Lover they abide, 

At one with Him, the Crucified. 

Strong in His Strength, they labour still 
To work His everlasting Will, 

To purge impurity, to bring 
Peace and great joy to the sorrowing. 

They labour still; but have no pain, 

No aching fear, no battle-strain. 

Serene they do His dear behest; 

And in His labour they have rest. 


CAMBRIDGE : PRINTED BY 
J. B. PEACE, M.A., 

AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 


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